#neo-luddism

[mesimees]

Once again: the AI isn't evil, the people creating them and processing your data are. As a person whose grad school major is literally called Artificial Intelligence I am BEGGING people to use offline programs if you really want to use it. And offline really means offline. Make sure it does not send any data back even if it's for supposed quality control or w/e. Do Not trust these companies with your data.

And on another slightly unrelated note (sorry if this derails OP), AIs can be really fun and cool and good but they are also exactly what the weaving machines were at the start of the industrial revolution. The ones that were smashed by the luddites in protest about the devaluation of labor, those ones. That wasn't about the weaving machines being bad, it was about the abhorrent way the workers were treated with their arrival. Like what OP said about automatic translation: it's a really neat tool to have around when you have nothing else, but it sucks ass that they've become a replacement for human translators. I don't think that's the AI's fault so much as the way we view it as all powerful replacement tool and that we devalue human labor in the process. Same with AI art! Super cool! It's absolutely amazing what neural nets can create these days. But it is not! a replacement! of human art! AI art is and should stay its own separate thing and we should value it as such instead of once again making it a cheap replacement of its human counterpart because doing so does both a great disservice.

Like photography didn't replace painting as an art, AI art shouldn't replace human art but live beside it.

Hey, do y’all remember how Tencent said they were developing faceID AI to identify people in riots, and then they suddenly created an AI art generator to turn your selfies into anime?

Do y’all remember that time that someone discovered facial recognition cameras couldn't see through Juggalo makeup, then Facebook had a fun “see what you'd look like with Juggalo makeup” thing, and then facial recognition cameras could suddenly see through Juggalo makeup?

Do y’all remember how, on Twitter, Elon started a tirade against artists who ask for credit when their art is reposted, and he suddenly he created one of the first big art AI programs?

Do y’all remember how AI destroyed the field of translation, despite the inferiority of the machine translations, because people didn’t care about the quality of the translations? They just wanted it done for free?

Do you know how companies will see a lot of money going into a New Tech Thing (like, say, AI art apps) and will jump to try and implement that New Tech Thing into their tech? For example, how it felt like every big company and celebrity had an NFT to sell?

Just wondering.

[milf--adjacent]

Weird how these "you just hate genAI because you're a priviliged person who adds no real value" people don't have similar opinions about cars and homes and other things being utilized as weapons of the class war used by owners to keep workers in their place. Why is rallying against private transportation not neo-luddism but "GenAI has made it impossible for me to find jobs in my field" is? Kinda makes a feller wonder.

[biracy]

Also I'm well-known for this take already but the idea that Phone is some kind of society-destroying brain-damaging evil because it impacts productivity oops sorry "creativity" is veeery direct conservative reactionary bullshit. This also applies to the concept of an "attention span" and how a "long" attention span is framed as a net positive and even a moral good (even and especially among people I know with diagnosed adhd which like, lol). The kneejerk worship of "productivity" (yes even "creative" productivity), manual labor ("making REAL things with your HANDS"), and neo-luddism ("phone bad" and etc) are all central tenets of modern trad and fash movements, but no one actually ever bothered to learn what those words mean so we ended up here. Phone is literally destroying your brain and you're a worthless slime mold if you don't carve wood or bake bread and society is degenerating because cars are being made in fewer colors. #woke

[kahin]

whats pissing me off is the pearl clutching abt AI usage in general. like fine if you wanna bring up ETHICAL issues abt it like its power consumption + art theft fine. but the pearl clutching isnt even abt that it. its just the whole "the robots are taking over!!!" but in a more modern format. like late night with the devil used AI for a split-second transition. the movie was not written with AI. numerous people worked on the movie. and im still seeing so much ppl talking abt how its "devaluing the movie's credibility" like!! ppl used AI as a base and edited it further is the thing. the neo luddism has to stop

[balioc]

I've been seeing a lot of chatter, recently, about how the rationalist community was built around a cultural seed of obsession with AI safety. And that just seems...straightforwardly misleading?

I mean, it's not insane. The AI safety stuff was definitely there from the very beginning. But it wasn't the focus of the early rationalist-sphere. It certainly wasn't the emotional focus.

Better to say: the rationalist community was built around a cultural seed of obsession with building a godlike FGAI to save us all. It was very...singularitarian, messianically singularitarian, in its first flower. The focus on alignment and friendliness and orthogonality was a "how we get there" thing, and a counterbalance to a hyper-naive "literally any superintelligence we can construct will be automatically benevolent and wise" position. Neo-luddism was despised, and all the emotional energy was pushing towards AI optimism. That gradually shifted as the rationalist-driven decision-theory-focused constructive AI research projects mostly went nowhere, and other people's AI projects started getting big and successful, and none of the alignment/friendliness/orthogonality stuff particularly made it out of the rationalist-sphere.

Or -- am I missing something? Do I have the arc of this particular history wrong, somehow? I was never actually a community member myself, so I'm sure there were things I'm missing.

[grungeincluded]

‘‘Of course, my paintings are political. All art is political one way or another. The greatest challenge for myself is to not make propaganda art. Art that defines one way of looking at something or one idea that is easily interpreted is not always interesting art. While this kind of art might be agreeable it is also dangerous art. When art has become a marketing tool I doubt that it can any longer be a critic.’’ - Greg Lukens

© Grunge Included | @37fotosb

[morlock-holmes]

People misunderstood what I meant; I wasn't clear enough.

I'm not predicting the future.

Rather, I am saying that *if* you argue that certain kinds of technological advancements are inevitable, you make it impossible to see technological advancement as liberating or revolutionary.

@not-terezi-pyrope

I agree with you that neo-luddism often, maybe usually has destructive aims, and I agree that it often classifies the world in aesthetic terms which make it very difficult to create positive change.

But, I think being immersed in the left-tech world you have your own blind spot, because here is how I would summarize your argument:

"Certain kinds of technological progress are inevitable. The question of whether they happen or not long ago passed out of human hands. The tools we have built *will* become our masters, and politics and human effort must now be devoted to the question of whether we have a good master or a bad master."

In order to get around that, you retreat to the material goods that the good master can provide for us, which are all fine and dandy and accurate, but they *do* come from the master.

How, with all of this implicit in your argument, could tech be liberating? A part of freedom is the ability to say, "No".

This neo-luddism is more than the result of simple aesthetic difference or reflexive dislike of capitalism; it's a response to real and very serious issues with the arguments you're making, and with the implicit blind spots in left-tech-boosterism.

I don't *like* that response; but it's a response to a legitimate problem.

One of the big blind spots of left tech boosterism (And dozens of other allied and competing philosophies, it's heavily built into the world order we all grew up in) is a belief that it doesn't matter who makes the decisions, as long as the results are good.

In other words, if someone makes a good decision for me, and forces me to follow it whether I like it or not, that's considered an equivalent result to me making that decision for myself, because the results are what matter.

This premise is actually very questionable!

Health and abundance may be *necessary* for freedom but we should never make the mistake of thinking that they are *sufficient*.

The casual and widespread disdain that people on the left have for the human inventiveness that has brought us modern lifesaving healthcare, food infrastructure, and a global connected community in exchange for a sort of noses-in-the-air trad/naturecore aesthetic larping is the ugliest thing about other members of my political demographic imo and is easily the largest ideological barrier preventing people in STEM fields from being more attracted to leftist movements.

People will deny that they have this bias, but this is because the air they breathe and the water they drink is so steeped in it they cannot see the wood for the trees. This assumption that tech = capitalism = destruction = evil, unlike us good pure anarcho-lefties with our trees and our rooftop gardens, we know how to return to nature like God intended and live lives of ascetic rural purity. None of this modern decadence - anyone who engages with that shit is automatically suspicious!

It's a purely aesthetic snobbery, ironically reactionary and regressive, that ignores the realities of living in a connected society and improving the quality of life of real people. It ignores the potential of technology as a revolutionary tool in favour of naïve and absurdly unworkable calls for blanket bans on all new (and some old) technologies. In doing so, it cedes the entire cultural cachet of science and tech innovation over to the centrist right, along with all of the political, social and cultural power that comes with embracing and shaping these movements constructively. It gives our best tools to the enemy and tells us that to be True Leftists we must shun these obviously useful things lest we fall prey to the decadences of convenience, such as being able to do video calls with one's long distance boyfriend or not dying of fucking cancer.

I hate this attitude so much and I am beseeching people to change the image of the left, especially left-anarchism, so that we can embrace tech, science and engineering as a tool of our own liberation instead of something to be scorned, left to the capitalists to monopolize, and then outlawed through the power of the state we are supposed to be fuckin' abolishing.

[onetouchteststrip]

"A technological advance that appears not to threaten freedom often turns out to threaten it very seriously later on. For example, consider motorized transport. A walking man formerly could go anywhere he pleased, go at his own pace without observing any traffic regulations, and was independent of technological support-systems. When motor vehicles were introduced they appeared to increase man's freedom. They took no freedom away from the walking man, no one had to have an automobile if he didn't want one, and anyone who did choose to buy an automobile could travel much farther than a walking man. But the introduction of motorized transport soon changed society in such a way as to restrict greatly man's freedom of locomotion. When automobiles became numerous, it became necessary to regulate their use extensively. In a car, especially around densely populated areas, one cannot just go where one likes at one's own pace, one's movement is governed by the flow of traffic and various traffic laws. One is tied down by various obligations: license requirements, drivers test, renewing registration, insurance, maintenance required for safety, monthly payments on purchase price. Moreover, the use of motorized transport is no longer optional. Since the introduction of motorized transport, the arrangement of our cities has changed in such a way that the majority of people no longer live within walking distance of their place of employment, shopping areas and recreational opportunities, so they they HAVE TO depend on the automobile for transportation. Or else they must use public transportation, in which case they have even less control over their own movement than when driving a car. Every walker's freedom is now greatly restricted. In the city he continually has to stop to sit for traffic lights that are designed mainly to serve auto traffic. In the country, motor traffic makes it dangerous and unpleasant to walk along the highway. (Note this important point that we have just illustrated withy hr case of motorized transport: When a system of technology is introduced as an option that an individual can accept or not as he chooses, it does not necessarily REMAIN optional. In many cases the new technology changes society in such a way that people eventually find themselves FORCED to use it.)

[transhumanitynet]

The Social Futurist Worldview (3/4)

This piece is part of a series exploring salient aspects of the philosophy known as “Social Futurism” (a term coined and idea developed by myself from 2011-2018). For more full and systematic exploration of these ideas, see http://socialfuturist.party & http://socialfuture.institute.

Remaking the World

We all long for Eden, and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature at its best and least corrupted, its gentlest and most human, is still soaked with the sense of exile. ― J.R.R. Tolkien

The essence of the Transhumanist idea is to remake the world, which is to say both the human condition and environment. To take away the pain and suffering associated with our mortal, biological circumstances, to move beyond our historical limitations. Aside from the fact that most Transhumanists are atheists (or at least agnostic), the reason that religious believers often feel antipathy toward Transhumanism is that it not only treads on the territory of their ancient and unfulfilled promises, but also that it actually has a chance of fulfilling them. With technology and the will to do so, we could in principle remake the world, and make it better.

3.1  Homo Homini Lupus Est: Beyond Human Brutality

As Titus Maccius Plautus said, “Man is as a Wolf to (Other) Men”. For all our ideals and technologies, as a species we are still animals, still quick to resort to violence when frustrated, and to use force (some forms more subtle than others) to get what we want. In reshaping our nature, Transhumanism offers the opportunity to change that… but we must tread very carefully indeed in making any such changes. Our “base animal nature” (to use a very Nineteenth Century phrase) is as it is for very good evolutionary reasons. To put it bluntly, it has kept us alive this long.

The basic ethos of Social Futurism is to embrace the transformative power of technology, but to do so in an intelligent and principled manner. Wilful Neo-Luddite ignorance, badly planned or executed technological intervention, and unprincipled exploitation are all equally problematic “failure modes” from a Social Futurist point of view. Following that logic, messing up an alteration of human nature in ways that endanger others is no less an error than opposing technology altogether, or using it for self-aggrandisement at the expense of the community.

3.2  Abolitionism & the Hedonistic Imperative

It is a small step from considering augmentation of the human condition, to thinking about upgrading nonhuman animals with technology. The latter idea is sometimes referred to as “Uplifting”, and bears some similarities to the idea of Abolitionism, as advanced by philosopher David Pearce. Simply put, Abolitionism is the idea that humans and other animals could be (genetically) engineered so as not to suffer, while preserving the motivational structures that pain evolved to serve. Discussions of the viability of that idea are beyond the scope of this piece, so for now we must restrict ourselves to two simple observations: (1) Abolitionism is, in principle at least, an explicit aspect of the Social Futurist philosophy. You can be an Abolitionist without considering yourself a Social Futurist, but all Social Futurists must inevitably at least recognise the Abolitionist ideal as one that is compatible with Social Futurist Principle. (2) That said, Abolitionism is not only an incredibly ambitious technical project, but it also comes with many attendant ethical challenges. Social Futurists are committed to taking those challenges seriously, not as a priori reasons to ban augmentation of animal biology, but as issues to be properly addressed before such work can be undertaken in a manner which is in accord with our principles.

For a whirlwind tour of potential issues, consider the following questions: What potential unforeseen consequences of such alteration might we encounter? How do we approach the matter of voluntary/desired “suffering” in humans? Is that even a real phenomenon, or does desired suffering cease to be true suffering? Can such a thing exist for animals? What about a little melancholy of the sort that has inspired the greatest poets; does that count? On what grounds should humans be able to refuse such alteration, for themselves or their children? Is it a problem that animals cannot give consent? What purely technical risks exist? (i.e. What might go wrong? How, and how badly?) How can such risks be mitigated? And so on.

3.3  Transhumanism as Radical Ecology

Beyond human nature itself, and that of other animals, the third part of our world is our environment (in the “green”, ecological sense). Just as we could in principle improve human and animal nature through the reasoned application of high technology, we could also do the same for the environment. Although technological development and expansion of the human population have caused a lot of environmental damage, the most effective solution to that problem is not to abandon technology altogether (even if that were a realistic option, which it is not). Although technology misapplied has caused considerable problems, the best way to solve those problems is to apply newer, higher technology in an intelligent and principled manner.

What kind of solutions are we talking about, specifically? Nanotechnology will be able to clean pollutants from air, soil, and water. Alternatives to fossil fuels already exist, and are only blocked by political-economic (i.e. Capitalist) interests. Space-Based Solar Power (SBSP) has the potential to render all other fuel resources redundant, even if our civilizational power needs grew to be a thousand times what they are now. The possibility of offworld-living is regularly mocked, but it is not nearly as crazy as people tend to imagine. Decimated rainforests can be replaced with a combination of less reliance on them as a raw resource (who needs wood when vastly advanced synthetic materials are cheaply available?) and genetic engineering to re-establish species on the brink of extinction. We can heal this planet, if we so choose, and that would just be the beginning.

3.4  End Game: Augmenting Intelligence in a World of Natural Stupidity

All of these things are technically feasible, at least in principle. One approach – or even ten thousand – may fail, but we only need one to succeed. The real obstacle is humanity itself, and its stubborn adherence to narrow-minded, old-fashioned ways of thinking and acting. As I have explained in the previous parts of this series, we must break the chains of the past and its conventional moralities if we are to survive and thrive, as a species and a civilization.

Transhumanists and Social Futurists seek not only to create Artificial Intelligences, but to augment our own minds and bodies. To move beyond outmoded constraints, and become more. The world is full of stupidities – some merely regrettable and others dangerously wilful – and we can no longer allow them to hold us back. We must transcend ignorance by all means necessary, save ourselves, and save the planet in doing so.

The Social Futurist Worldview (3/4) was originally published on transhumanity.net

[cosmogyros]

It's kind of ridiculous that people are scolded for staring at their phones and told to "look up and interact with the world" although they might be using the phone to interact with anyone, anywhere in the world – and meanwhile I, scribbling away navel-gazingly in my notebook and not paying attention to anything but the inside of my own head, somehow get a free pass.

[collegeinit]

Neo Luddism (negative impact of technology)

The application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes is growing day by day. Technology solves problems with the various invention. Technology has both negative and positive impacts. The pace of technology is transforming society which has made life easy but also created inequality between people. The rise of technology (such as nuclear technology, automation) has raised many questions doubting technology. Neo-Luddism or new Luddism is an ideology opposing many forms of technology. This ideology was active in the early stage of the 90s. People having the same ideology is called neo-Luddite. Neo Luddites oppose technology that is materialistic or destructive of society.

Rise of technology

As a student of information technology, I have seen Technology has a big impact on the industrial revolution which has caused a large scale of urbanization. The technology was enhancing productivity with various inventions which helped industries work fast, easy and profitable. Due to this reason technology created many workers unemployed and in this period the labor wage started decreasing. This has created a big economic gap between people. Neo Luddism ideology is critical about technology. Neo Luddite is growing and cautious to adopt rising technology. Technology may be great but it can be harmful too. Technology is changing our society day by day. During my research I have found data from 1979 to 2008 U.S population has increased by 35% and manufacturing employments have dropped 31% from 19.4 million jobs to 13.5 million jobs. Technology invention has eliminated the jobs of humans by reducing the price of production. The adaption of technology has created huge unemployment for blue-collar jobs such as labor. It has also created a fear of losing jobs towards workers in various fields. Everyone is working very hard even when productivity has increased because of the fear of losing the job.

Internet

The Internet is one of the popular inventions of Technology. It is a great source of information but every source is not reliable and trustworthy. I found 40% of the world’s population is using social media. Technology has reduced distance between people but it has also created distance of social relationships between people. The Internet has grown and every new generation is now involving in social media. Social media is very addictive, people on average spend two hours every day. Using computers for a long period can cause burring the vision. The screen of a computer can generate radiation that can harm the eyes. According to me, Social media has a good impact on society but it also has a toxic environment. People have too much involved their life in social media. It can cause distractions while we are doing focused work. As more users are using the internet everyone may not have good intentions.

Increasing the use of computers has increased computer crimes. Technology is growing rapidly and breaching our privacy. Nowadays, privacy issues are also rising as a student of information technology privacy of an individual is very important. Tracking location and spying information of an individual can be very easy for professionals because of electronic devices connected to a network. Big corporate are collecting data of people and data can be the next source of income. Many websites collect data and use them for advertisement and marketing. Websites collecting data can track location and know users' likes and dislikes. Every individual has a different experience in social media but as I have seen social media it can influence people's perception. I have seen a piece of news about Cambridge Analytica which has collected millions of data of American citizens without their concern which helped Donald Trump to elect as a president of America. From this scenario, I can tell social media can influence and manipulate people. Mental health professionals are getting concerned about the impact of social media on mental health.

Digital divide

According to me, technology has created a Digital divide between people. Aleph Molinari described the digital divide as,” The Digital Divide is the gap between individuals and communities that have access to information technologies and those that don’t”. Mobile, internet, computer, etc are technologies creating a digital divide. The Internet has been a great source for information but everyone can’t access the internet because of poverty which creates information poverty. Every day new inventions are coming into the market and everyone can’t afford those inventions. Technology is made for the betterment of human life but it is causing enormous negative effects on human life and creating division.

Technology impact on the environment

Technology has a negative impact such as climate, energy, water and creates waste. The industry is consuming energy heavily. As the population is increasing use of vehicles using energy such as fuel is also increasing which is increasing air pollution. The usage of energy is affecting the earth’s climate. I have seen so many articles about global warming .technologies releasing carbon dioxide can be one of the causes of the greenhouse. Even in the field of agriculture uses technology which has a negative impact. Using pesticides, fertilizer and such chemicals can harm the soil. In context of Nepal I have not seen waste management from industry which is polluting the environment.

I found neo-Luddism is a philosophy that opposes technology that hampers human life. It shows the technological influence on people's life. People should know what they are using and how can they impact our lives. I found that while using technology people should be aware about how its working and its impacts in a long term. During my research I found various impacts of technology.

[milf--adjacent]

Saying "I don't want a robot who can't even do my job correctly to replace me just because it doesn't ask for benefits" isn't neo-luddism. Correctly pointing out that skilled labor is being replaced by an unpaid mediocre substitute that is helping to accelerate climate change doesn't even come close to being a computer-bashing luddite. Some of us just don't posess the elon musk fanboy gland y'all have repurposed to act like a weapon of the class war is some life-changing technology instead of a rebranded, overclocked chatbot designed to produce the same mediocre product without needing a wage.

The way some lefties on here will demand others read theory then turn around and compare generative "AI" to the cotton gin like it isn't a shoddy replica of labor meant to be an unpaid replacement that uses 8,000x more resources and still produces work outclassed by coked-up undergrads running on 8 cups of coffee, a free doughnut, and no sleep.

[polkadotmotmot]

José Fiol - Neo-Luddism, 2020

[kenyatta]

Outside San Francisco’s 49 square miles of unreality, economies like those of Europe have a social safety net to dampen the hardships for the lower classes. They also defend traditional industries and labor practices, in a (probably) futile effort to stem the threat from automation. Uber is banned in several places in Europe, and taxi drivers have mounted occasionally violent protests at the automation intrusion. Barcelona, one of Airbnb’s largest European markets, cracked down on that company’s rental listings, out of fears that large swaths of the old town center were becoming a huge Airbnb hotel.

As quixotic as the European Neo-Luddism might be, it does make for a pleasant place to live. One of the most refreshing things about living in Europe (or small towns in the rural US) is knowing that the poor aren’t condemned to a completely separate, and inferior, life. Your place in the world isn’t wholly defined by wealth.

The story is rather different in San Francisco.

There, the Outer Party, whose consumer life consists of telling mobile apps to tell humans to do things, has a different relationship with the Service Class. As an Instacart user for example, you’ll often have a person of color come to your door, laden with the groceries you couldn’t bother to buy yourself, and whose total value likely exceeds what they’ll make in a day of hefting and following Instacart prompts. Often, the order will contain errors, revealing that the buyer didn’t quite know what he was buying (fancy cheeses are particularly risky). You’ll peck at the app and leave a tip to assuage your conscience and avoid thinking about the soaring---and largely unshared---returns to technology and capital.

This, of course, is a burgeoning dystopic nightmare. But it is the vision of the future that San Francisco offers: highly stratified, with little social mobility. It's feudalism with better marketing. Today’s “sharing” economy resembles the “sharecropping” of yesteryear, with the serfs responding to a smartphone prompt rather than an overseer’s command.

[towel-pisser-nationalism]

S3E103 - COLLAPSOLOGY 101

 This week, @rtrixie, @elementarynationalism and a third panellist who is, for legal reasons, definitely not Jordan Peterson discuss artificial intelligence, Neo-Luddism and the arrival of the 21st century techno-Stasi this society deserves. Lukas undergoes the final stage of metamorphosis into Peter Schiff and Sam makes it further down memory lane to anti-capitalism.

[big-bird-nerd]

Anarcho-primitivism is just a cooler sounding name for neo-Luddism. Personally I support calling them Luddites, if nothing else to reduce propagandistic connection between anarchism and Luddism.